


Jack O'Lanterns

by RewriteDestiny



Category: Supernatural
Genre: (i think), Fluff, Halloween, M/M, UST
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2013-10-31
Updated: 2013-10-31
Packaged: 2017-12-31 01:49:26
Rating: Mature
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings
Chapters: 1
Words: 2,405
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/1025866
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/RewriteDestiny/pseuds/RewriteDestiny
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>Castiel is spending his first Halloween as a human and Dean thinks that there is a certain rite of passage that he needs to undertake.</p>
            </blockquote>





	Jack O'Lanterns

**Author's Note:**

> I think everybody needs some Destiel Halloween in their lives, right? I was feeling stressed and angry so I thought 'HEY, LET'S WRITE SOME HALLOWEEN FLUFF!' 
> 
> I wrote this at 2am and it's unbeta-ed so all mistakes are entirely my own. 
> 
> I hope everyone has a very happy and deliciously spooky Halloween!

It began with pumpkins. They started to show up on porches and windowsills. Pumpkin spice lattes were being sold and pumpkin pie was found in nearly every cafe. The year had shifted. Summer was long gone and the smell of toffee and wood smoke was beginning to travel on the cold wind. That is how every year happened, the cold had begins to set in and the pumpkins come out. 

This was an entirely new notion for Castiel. 

“But they have faces on them?” he said, looking bemusedly up at Dean from his diner meal, “very peculiar faces.” 

Dean found himself letting out a sigh and trying to think of the best way to go about explaining the concept to the ex-angel. 

“Humans have been carving faces into vegetables for thousands of years, Cas. Lore says that they keep the spirits away on Halloween. Obviously we know that’s bullshit, because there are spirits around all the time and no amount of scary faces are gonna discourage them.” 

Dean took another bite of his pumpkin pie. It was delicious. When he’d taken his first bite he’d nearly moaned in ecstasy before he’d remembered the bewildered man sat before him. 

Dean wasn’t meant to be here. He really was trying to keep his promise to Ezekiel, even if he hated the prospect of it. Sam would always come first. He had done since Dean had carried that tiny baby out of the burning house, and he would do until they both died for good ... maybe even after that. But Castiel had looked so forlorn. He was just trying to survive as a human. How could Dean just leave him? That meant that, every so often, Dean would contact Cas and buy him a good meal in secret. It didn’t get rid of those haunting blue eyes or the overwhelming guilt but it lessened it slightly. This week they were in a diner completely covered in paper ghosts, witches and haunted houses. Kids were bouncing around the joint clearly excited for the upcoming holiday. Dean was far less amused. 

Cas had gone back to staring at the Jack O’Lantern in the diner window. 

“I think they’re silly,” said Cas, thoughtfully. 

Dean tried to hide a smile. 

“They’re just fun to carve. Kids love them.” 

“Did you carve them?” asked Cas, his eyes wide. 

“No,” answered Dean, thinking back to his childhood and being told how ridiculous they were, “no, we never did.” 

“Then how would you know?” 

The question was innocent and completely without malice, but Dean felt the memories as a stab to the gut anyway. Ben sat at the kitchen table, surrounded by four of his friends, all trying desperately to carve into their pumpkins while Lisa looked on anxiously and kept repeating how she’d be the one blamed if someone lost a limb. Ben looking up at Dean, eventually asking ‘please help’ and allowing the hunter to dig in, easily carving open the top of the pumpkin. Once finished, it had stood proudly on the mantelpiece until three days before Thanksgiving when it finally disintegrated and Dean was charged with scooping the mess outside. The hunter took a deep breath and tried to push the memories away. 

“Hey, it’s probably time I started to get back,” said Dean, ignoring the question and pretending to be completely oblivious to the look of disappointment that Cas tried to mask. 

*

Dean can’t help himself. He knows that it is a stupid decision but he misses Cas, probably more than is entirely appropriate but that is a thought he will repress until another day. The guilt of throwing Cas out of the bunker tugged at him constantly and Dean knew that he’s do anything he could to ease it. 

That is how Dean Winchester found himself in an ex-angel’s tiny little apartment with a pumpkin under one arm. 

The apartment really was tiny. They had helped Cas find something in Omaha, so that he wasn’t in the same state as the bunker but he was still relatively easy to get to. It had a tiny kitchen, with a tiny lounge attached to it and through the doorway there was a tiny bedroom with a tiny en-suite. Dean felt guilty every time he thought about making Cas stay in a place like this but anything beats living on the streets, right?

Dean set the pumpkin down on the small table and glanced up at the ex-angel, suddenly feeling rather ridiculous. 

“What are you doing?” asked Castiel, fixing Dean with a piercing gaze that was no less intense because of his humanity. 

“Look Cas, I know being human is ... difficult for you. Just like living inside these four walls is difficult and sleeping is difficult ...” Dean paused, hoping that maybe Castiel would understand what he was trying to say but, obviously, he did not. 

The ex-angel just continued to stare at him from across the table, fidgeting ever so slightly with the sleeve of his shirt. 

“Okay, basically,” continued Dean, wondering why he was getting flustered and just trying to plough on, “carving pumpkins is a rite of passage and it’d be a nice addition to your place.” 

Castiel looked so out of place in this dingy little apartment. He had once been an almighty, terrible figure and now he was just trying to survive day-to-day. Dean’s chest burned with pity, but there was admiration in him too. The ex-angel hadn’t given up yet. He hadn’t thrown in the towel. He was still trying to live and survive an ordinary existence. Wasn’t that the bravest thing anyone could do? 

Dean shucked his jacket off and rounded the table so that he was stood next to the other man. Then he pulled a knife out of his pocket (of course) and held it out to Cas. 

“Here you go, do you wanna do the honours?” 

Casiel didn’t move. He just started dubiously at the knife. 

Dean raised his eyebrows and withdrew his hand, pulling a chair out from under the small table and sitting on it, just as Cas did the same thing next to him. Then, Dean pulled the pumpkin towards him and started to carve the top.

“Look, you carve the top off so that it’s like a lid, right?” said Dean, slowly demonstrating and makings sure that the cerulean eyes were staring down at his hands. 

Cas nodded slowly as Dean pulled the lid away. 

“Then you scrape out all of the gunk inside. You can do that part,” smirked Dean, picking up a bowl from the sink behind him and setting it by Cas. 

Cas dubiously reached his hand into the pumpkin and then made a face. 

“Eurgh,” he said, quickly withdrawing his hand as Dean laughed next to him. 

“Hey, come on! We’re totally having fun.”

Dean would never quite know what possessed him to do what he did next. Maybe it was the bewildered way that Cas stared down at the pumpkin, maybe it was the sight of the once mighty angel just trying to do something so human, but slowly Dean placed one hand over Castiel’s and guided it back down into the pumpkin. 

If he felt a shock surge through him as their skin touched and heard a slight hitching of breath coming from the man beside him, then he chose not to acknowledge it. 

Dean gently squeezed Cas’s fingers closed over the pumpkin seeds, determinedly not looking at the other man, and murmured “there, have you got it” before gently pulling both of their hands out and breaking contact. 

They sat in silence for a few moments after that. Dean felt as if he was balanced on the edge of something. It was as if a wall had been carefully constructed between them for a very long time and, with that one gesture, he had threatened to bring it all crashing down. The green eyes met the blue and Dean found his mind consciously reminding itself that they were friends, only friends, always friends. Their eye contact lingered, the ex-angel’s eyes clouded with something that Dean couldn’t read. He wanted to touch Castiel again. He wanted to feel the warmth of the other man’s skin; the blood pumping round the body; the bray of his heartbeat that said ‘I am human, so very human’. 

Abruptly, Dean realized what was happening and snapped his eyes away. Carving pumpkins had been a stupid idea. 

“Go on then, scrape all of the insides out,” said Dean, trying his best to sound light but realizing that he was slightly breathless. 

Castiel’s cheeks seemed tinged with a light blush as he plunged his hands back into the pumpkin. 

“Humanity really does have some disgusting traditions,” said Castiel after a few minutes of silence, turning his nose up at the orange gloop on his hands. 

“Dude, you’ve slaughtered leviathan and you think this is disgusting?” asked Dean, his eyesbrows raised. 

“You make a fair point.” 

“Of course I do. All the points I make are fair.” 

Silence stretched between them again, thick with all the things that they would never say. 

“You know, some of the lore on why they’re called Jack O’Lanterns is pretty interesting,” said Dean, scrambling for something to talk about but also considering that Cas might find this topic interesting.  
“It’s said that a man named Stingy Jack tricked the devil into turning into a silver coin with which to pay for stolen goods, but then he placed the coin next to a cross and so trapped the devil there until he agreed not to take his soul to Hell. If only it were that easy, eh? The devil agreed but then, once Jack died, he didn’t go to Hell but he wasn’t let into Heaven either. When Jack asked the devil how he would see where to go, the devil gave him a burning ember from Hell and so Jack was damned to forever roam the earth with the burning ember, searching for where he should go.” 

There was silence between them again. 

“That is an interesting story,” said Cas, turning to glance up at Dean. 

“Yeah ... obviously we know it is bullshit because the devil can’t be held down by just a cross and if there was a guy wandering the earth then we’d just waste him ... but the story’s good ...” 

“Actually, we battled with Lucifer,” said Cas, his voice level as he looked intently at Dean. 

“Er ... yeah?” 

“The devil may be something else.” 

Dean felt his heart sink ever so slightly before he shook his head and said,   
“Well, aren’t you a beacon of good news?!” 

Dean looked at Castiel. He had finished scooping out the insides, so the pumpkin was just waiting for a face to be carved into it. Cas wiped his hands down on a dishcloth and seemed to be waiting for Dean to tell him what he should do next. Dean shot him a small smile, thinking about all of the little human experiences that Castiel had never had. He had expected just a small smile in return, the usual quirking up of Cas’ lips when he finds something vaguely humorous. Dean had not expected the wide grin that spread across Cas’ lips. It lit up his entire face, illuminating his lamp-like eyes and making something leap in the pit of Dean’s stomach. Dean had seen this person take down angels, demons and everything in between. He had known him when he was an angel of the lord, an almighty soldier that could topple entire civilizations with one word. When Castiel had first walked into that barn, oh-so-long-ago, Dean had thought that he had never seen a sight more stunning. He was wrong. 

This Castiel, with the messy hair and the wide, open grin meant only for Dean was, without a doubt, the most beautiful thing that the hunter had ever seen. 

A moment passed between them. The ex-angel glanced down at Dean’s lips. It was only for a second, one hungry look down to the hunter’s mouth, and Dean knew that there was no going back. His breath hitched in his throat before Dean finally moved forward and ghosted his lips over the ex-angel’s. They were barely touching, just sharing oxygen and nerves and life. Dean’s mouth was only just grazing the other man’s dusty-rose lips. It was Cas that took the next step. His mouth closed on Dean’s in a moment of heated electricity and Dean felt some long forgotten part of him jerk awake. It was as if the part of his soul that was reserved for true passion had been lying dormant for eternity and Castiel’s lips had ignited it. Dean brought his right hand up to cup Castiel’s cheek, feeling the warmth of the other man’s flesh against his palm to remind himself that this was real, this was happening. Dean then felt a hand move tentatively against his waist, holding him steady against his shirt as the kiss deepened. Mouths parted and Dean felt Castiel’s tongue hot against his own. He couldn’t resist letting out a low groan in the back of his throat and this made Castiel’s grip tighten on his waist, pulling him closer with fingernails that dug into his skin. 

They revelled in sensation. Hard, hot bodies finally meeting. One hand hooking into the belt loop of Cas’ jeans. One hand slowly sliding under Dean’s shirt; the cold hand of an ex-angel pressing against the hard muscles of a hunter’s torso. 

Dean gasped and pulled Cas up from his chair, pushing him against the table so that their bodies were in closer proximity to each other. Their mouths broke apart as Dean began to run hot kisses down the other man’s neck, revelling in the breathy noises that he was eliciting from Cas’ throat. He could still feel that hand beneath his shirt, running slowly down the contours of his back, making him shiver and want so that he surged forwards and pressed his hips against Cas’. They both gasped at the same time until – 

CRASH! 

They broke apart. 

“Oh no, the pumpkin!” exclaimed Cas, staring down at the pieces of orange mess on the floor beside the table. 

Dean felt a laugh bubble up in his throat and he buried his face into the hot skin of Castiel’s neck. 

“Oh forget about that,” Dean whispered, his breath ghosting against the sensitive skin, “this is much more interesting.”


End file.
